1. Field of the Invention
The disclosure relates to a method and system for providing financial products to a customer and, more specifically, to providing automated electronic switching of customer selected financial transactions for a customer banking account from a first provider to a second provider with minimal customer input.
2. Description of Related Art
Customers are typically reluctant to switch service providers because of the inconvenience and effort to transfer data without particularly large incentives, such as significant savings. Bank and other financial institutions may offer quality services at competitive rates, but often find that customers are still reluctant to switch to a new service provider. When moving a banking relationship, the customer generally is especially concerned about moving automated financial transactions. These automated financial transactions generally fall into three categories: direct deposits, automatic withdrawals, and electronic payment of bills. Often, the electronic bill payments are conducted through online Web sites, tone activated systems such as through a telephone, or other electronic based payment system, broadly referenced herein as “Web bill pay.” For online payments, the customer may have two categories, namely, those that are pre-assigned to be paid a specific amount on a specific day, and those to which the payee information is already entered and the customer need simply enter the particular amount and instruct payment, where the remaining process is automated. If the customer is financially motivated to switch accounts to another financial provider, the effort involved in switching some or all of the above information to the new provider may be daunting. In at least some cases, a customer is simply resigned to maintaining the existing banking relationship even though financially it may be to the customer's benefit to move the account.
In the past, the best switching tools in the industry appear to have been a system for generation of online forms for customers to print, sign, and mail in order to switch direct deposits, automatic withdrawals, and even close accounts. No solution for switching online bill payment services was found to exist in practice. Some providers provided online switch kits that pre-filled some customer information or provided drop-down menus that failed to switch over the customer data.
Thus there remains a need for an easier and more fully utilized switching system and method for automated electronic transactions of the customer to another financial service provider.